Eric Quint's Three A's of Design
Awareness. Appreciation. Ambassador.
This was a great episode of Clever, featuring Eric Quint, Chief Design Officer of 3M. His "three A's" are a great way to look at a common problem in the design industry: how to get others excited about your ideas. You could have an amazing idea, but if people don't understand your approach, they can't possibly champion your idea. How could they tell your human-centered story to others if they have limited exposure to this way of thinking? Quint is talking about this in a corporate environment, but it absolutely applies to consulting as well. We need to help our clients be ambassadors for our ideas, so they can get people excited in their organization. Here's the quote:
“I see a lot of challenges with other leaders in putting design on the agenda in an appropriate way. I use what I refer to as the Three A’s: Awareness, Appreciation, and Ambassador. You can have an expectation that you want to create excitement with your colleagues across the organization, but you cannot expect them to be an Ambassador if they do not Appreciate what you do. And they can’t Appreciate what you do if they don’t have any Awareness of what you do. Where I see a lot of designers go wrong is they have high expectations on the Ambassadorship, but they totally forget about explaining what design is about, what it’s doing, how it creates value, and how we can collaborate.”